I was £1.5 million in debt – now my pants company makes £6 million a year & Fearne Cotton loves them
A BUSINESSWOMAN has told how she went from finding out she was £1.5 million in debt to now running a very successful underwear company.
Katie Lopes, the founder and creative director of sustainable underwear brand Stripe and Stare, may run a company that makes a whopping £6 million a year, but things weren’t always looking so bright.
Speaking to Grace Beverley on podcast ‘Working Hard, Hardly Working,’ Katie explains how she started out in the TV industry.
After being transferred to Australia for a year, she was eventually offered an incredible promotion that would’ve made her the youngest producer at Channel 7 at the time.
But, after looking at women and the sacrifices they were making in their personal lives, Katie says she turned the job down after realising it wasn’t the path for her.
Deciding to do something different and eager to take control of her own life, she realised the job that could allow her to have a family while still working hard resided in the fashion industry.
After living with her sister in Australia, the pair realised there were so many brands that weren’t available in England, so they set up their own retail business on the King’s Road in Chelsea.
The business aimed to stock brands you couldn’t get in England – including the likes of Zimmerman and Rag and Bone.
We used to get people like Sienna Miller coming in all the time and Kate Middleton came there the day after she got engaged…she literally just wandered in with her mum
Katie Lopes
“Between 2004 when we opened and 2008, London was really good and flourishing,” says Katie, who grew up in Devon.
“We had such an amazing customer base.
“We used to get people like Sienna Miller coming in all the time and Kate Middleton came there the day after she got engaged…she literally just wandered in with her mum.”
Katie goes on to explain how she’d started selling a brand of lacy g-strings from America, which were famous for being super comfortable.
“Women were coming in and buying armfuls of this product,” she recalls. “They weren’t cheap – they were like £18 for a rolled up ball of lace.
“…that really interested me and I loved the simplicity of an underwear, that’s non seasonal and really simple sizing.”
Katie says she soon realised there was a gap in the market after noticing there was no one making a “super cool, soft sustainable pair of knickers for every day.”
After getting her mum to make the first prototype, named Cheap Frills, on her sewing machine, the popularity grew from there.
Over the next six to eight years, Katie says they became the store’s best-seller and it wasn’t long before she realised she had something globally saleable with volume appeal that was much simpler than she was doing.
However, she soon faced her first hurdle and had to give up the brand name due to a legal wrangle with a brand in Austria – and in 2017, Stripe and Stare was launched.
While the business started to grow, Katie’s personal life was falling apart – after finding out her ex husband had left them £1.5 million in debt and homeless.
She describes how this all happened in the “week from hell,” which also saw her father tragically die following a long battle of cancer, and her house burgled from “top to bottom” while she was at her father’s funeral.
Side hustles in numbers
Based on new research from Finder, an estimated 22.8 million Brits are using side hustles to top up their income.
Among generation Z (those aged 18-23) 68 percent have a side hustle in 2024.
Millennials (aged 24-42) aren’t far behind, with 65 per cent having an additional source of income.
Side hustles are less popular among older generations, with 40 percent of generation X (aged 43-54) having one.
Whereas 23 percent of baby boomers (aged 55-73) and just 7 per cent of the silent generation (aged 74 and over) are earning extra cash this way.
However, Katie continues: “It was a lot but I am actually grateful for it which sounds strange but I think these are the moments you find out who you are, what you can do.”
She goes on to say how it took two years to rebuild her life and get back to the point she felt back to “normal.”
Explaining how she emotionally got through it, Katie recalls: “There were moments I really didn’t.
“There was never going to be a quick fix.
“I just remember all my friends and family around me like how are we going to help her? What are we going to do? There was just nothing anyone can do.”
Katie says the only way forward was to take a “slow and steady” approach and to make a lot of tough decisions.
“I moved out of London which I why I’d moved back to Devon because I had a support system there, it was much cheaper with the children, my brother was really sweet and had a house we could live in.
“I was so so lucky that I had an amazing group of friends and big family that pulled me through.”
After moving to Devon, Katie started Stripe and Stare from scratch in 2017 with the help of an angel investor and an old friend who she trusted – Nicola Piercy.
“I needed her to be my rock…after going through that sort of trauma you need people you know you can rely on…that’s how we founded it.”
It was a lot but I am actually grateful for it which sounds strange but I think these are the moments you find out who you are, what you can do
Katie Lopes
They accepted £70k of investment and decided to develop the business organically, and it’s since gone from strength to strength.
Not only does the underwear company boast clients including Oprah Winfrey and Fearne Cotton, but last year alone they turned over almost £6 million, according to Crowdcube.
“I’m really grateful it happened to me because what would I be doing now if it hadn’t?” Katie says.
“I wouldn’t be finding out all of these things I’m capable of.
“It’s still a long way to go with Stripe and Stare but I’m so proud of what we’ve done – we’ve got a team now of 30.”
